Pollock-Inspired Salad Spinner Art

A couple of weeks ago Pumpkin started taking seasonal arts and crafts classes.  Now, she wants to do art all the time. We are running out of tempera paint!
  I felt like doing something abstract with her and thought about Jackson Pollock.  He was a "human spinner" holding buckets of paint in his hands and spinning around on the canvas creating his works of art that way(you can give it a shot on a summer day on your back yard). Yesterday we did some less messy Pollock-inspired art using a salad spinner. It's fast and a lot of fun.
All you need is:

• a salad spinner
• non-toxic, washable tempera paint
• paper circles, cut to fit the bottom of your salad spinner( or paper plates if they fit)

What you do:
Open your spinner and put the paper on the bottom. Splatter/pour/drip any kinds of paint of any color in any pattern or non pattern at all(how cool is that!).  Then, put the top back on and spin it!  Open it up - ta-da!  Your art is ready.  All it needs now is some time to dry.
And do you know the best thing about it?  It never gets old because it comes out in a different way every time!
Here are some things that came out of our salad spinner.  We did a couple of them using "fall" colors. 

 

Here are some Jackson Pollock links you might find interesting:

http://www.nga.gov/feature/pollock/pollockhome.shtm

http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/pollock_jackson.html
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/468051/Jackson-Pollock
 http://www.manetas.com/pollock/ (Pollock interactive: create your own Pollock with a couple of mouse clicks)  
http://www.jacksonpollock.com/email.shtml  (very interesting about if there is a  structure in his art)

 

I hope all of you will have a lot of fun with it.  Unleash your inner Pollocks!

stART: Blueberries for Sal

I came across stART a couple of weeks ago and liked the idea of reading and art combination right away.  Our public library has a similar program every Saturday where children have a story hour first and then they do craft related to the story.  My daughter enjoys it very much.  This week I decided to participate in stART carnival created by A Mommy's Adventures. This week she has a fun craft, by the way.
Yesterday we read a classic children's book Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey.

The story has a great plot that children can relate themselves to. Two little ones - little girl Sal and Little Bear - get lost for a little while while picking blueberries which resulted in swapping moms and creating a comical situation enjoyable for young listeners.
We liked this story so much that we decided to make our own Blueberry Hill and the main characters so we could role play it.  I made the characters by drawing them with colored pencils and glueing them to cardboard.   Pumpkin and I made Blueberry Hill together.  Cardboard, colored paper, hole puncher and glue is all you will need.

This is our Blueberry Hill with two moms and two little ones.

Destination: Modern Art

I always admired Baby Einstein  for introducing little ones to the world of classical music and works of art.  I don't particularly agree with watching DVDs since "0" or 3 months like they advise, though.  But I love the idea of incorporating those two things in every day lives of children.  How cool is that when your toddler recognizes the paintings that most adults don't!  And you do know that all kinds of studies proved that classical music is just plain GOOD for all of us, I am sure.  It is relaxing and calming. Expecting women are recommended to listen to it because it benefits the healthy development of the fetus.  Also it has been proven that students who were listening to Mozart during their test did better than the ones who didn't.  It raises I.Q.  You just cannot go wrong with it!

Art is wonderful in any form - bottom line!
So on that note...
The other day Pumpkin and I were exploring the interactive MoMA site for kids. We both loved it!  An alien from a different planet lands in the heart of Manhattan and goes to the museum.  By clicking on the photos of the actual exhibits you not only learn facts about them and their creators but also play games, do activities and print out pages you can use later on!  After the tour around MoMA you go to P.S.1 art center which used to be a public school at one time and check out the art inside there.  The interactive tour is not too long but there is enough stuff at each exhibit that will keep you busy. Enjoy!

Air Painting

Today I decided to incorporate science with art which was a lot of fun for my Pumpkin.


The topic was air. We talked about why we need air and what element of it we need for breathing. I asked if we can touch air, if we can see it and later on explained that it's not a solid object.


We mentioned that air can move which creates wind. I asked my daughter to put her hand in front of her mouth and blow on it to feel the air. Then, I encouraged Pumpkin to take a piece of paper, blow on it and make a prediction of what is about to happen. Paper moves because air make it move.


As part of the discussion we made an experiment.


To make it you'll need:

• a piece of construction paper


• tempera paint


• a drinking straw

What to do:

• take a piece of paper and put some paint on it( I used primary colors to show how they mix and make new ones)


• give your child a straw and ask to blow on the paint through it

The air flow will move the paints around , mixing them and creating interesting shapes.

That's how it came out.

I did not add water to the paint. If you add some it will be more runny and splatter easier.

Give it a try. I assure your kids will love it!